The Merit Scholarship

My academic journey is a map of nonexistent schools. I have a bad history with the history of my education. Where I attended elementary is now a Planet Fitness. My junior high was converted into apartments, and my high school was simply erased, replaced by two newer, shinier versions of a future I wasn't part of. If you look for the landmarks of my youth, you won’t find a single building of matriculation. The most profound ghost is the Art Institute of Houston. It’s defunct now but in 1997, it was the center of my universe. I was a video production star there, a teacher’s pet with a 4.0 and a 24-hour rendering habit, oblivious to the fact that I was carving my name into ice. Success was measured in sleep deprivation and the hum of a Commodore 64. I was a wannabe film student who settled for a degree in video production in a city that at best offered film history classes. I spent my nights in the blue glow of the editing bay and my days wiping noses at a Montessori school, all to fund a dream that felt as solid as the Betacam tapes I hauled across Houston. I was the hero of a story that, thirty years later, has been completely recorded over.

Being the teachers’ pet was not unwarranted; I busted my butt for success. I was sure I could launch my filmmaking career after getting an associates degree at The Institute. Most of our assignments were projects that resulted in a video being produced. There was a vast array of students at the school, but especially within the video program. Like me, many came from smaller cities to seek careers in the big city. Others were lifelong Houstonians from every walk of life. As a very young adult who was only recently able to legally drink alcohol, I found it odd working with adults who had their own lives already: spouses and children, significant work histories, mortgages, car notes, etc. All the trappings of real adulthood mixed with us 18-21 year olds some of whom still lived with their parents.

So maybe in a project team of ten people, trying to complete a project was challenging because one member might have to pick their kids up from school at 4:00 while another had a shift at McDonalds at 6:00. I worked at a Montessori school from 8-5 Monday-Friday and attended school from 6-10 every weekday evening. The Institute’s labs were open 24/7, a sanctuary for the caffeinated and the obsessed. I didn’t mind the 3:00 AM shift, when the only sound was the low, electric hum of the rendering suite. There, on a literal pedestal, sat the Commodore 64. It was a beige dinosaur, a plastic relic of my childhood that my father, the electrical engineer, had insisted was superior to the Atari all my friends had. Back then, without knowing the significance, I punched in codes to make pixelated squares jump over lines. Now, in 1997, I was feeding it data and praying the ancient boards wouldn't fry before sunrise. Watching that green text flicker on the screen felt like a high-stakes gamble. If the 'dinosaur' crashed, twenty-four hours of work vanished into the ether.

To think that you can just ask AI to do this for you at that time would’ve been mind-blowing. There were nights when I had the studio booked to finish filming something followed by hours in one of the editing bays and perhaps the sound studio (audio production was my weakest area–to make it worse, I accidentally insulted my instructor when he introduced us to another staff member that had been in Steppenwolf and I blurted out, “At least that’s a band I’ve heard of.” My teacher had been in a band called Head East that was around in the 70s. They had a song on the Dazed and Confused soundtrack. At that time, that is all I knew about the band other than my teacher having been the drummer I think. It was really cool; I was just a stupid young adult who shouldn’t be blurting stuff out. Also, it was my weakest subject. I was definitely not teacher’s pet in my audio classes.

From the beginning, I was an over achiever because I loved everything about video production. I always tried to maneuver myself in every project as the writer, producer, director and/or editor. I really wanted to do it all every single time and had to negotiate and compromise with my designated project members. Plenty of students were content with coasting however. I didn’t mind. They were my crew. There were three or four of my peers who I loved working with due to their dedication, but like me, they wanted to do everything. Once we conceded and compromised, we made amazing videos. We liked to work together for that reason, but we also liked it when we weren’t in the same group because there was less competition for the prime rolls.

Eventually, I bonded with a core four who were around my age. It was the 90s after all so we were grungey in oversized flannels, wallet chains, and baggy jeans. Calvin mainly wanted to be a camera operator. He was very creative and had great ideas, but would let me do the writing. I had a crush on him. So did Natalie. She was definitely crew material and the one who worked part time at McDonalds. Finally, there was Gary. Gary had mossy looking teeth because he never brushed them. They all lived with their parents and had few responsibilities and were just a year or two out of high school. I had an apartment and a full time job. We were similar but not the same.

Each semester, each project, we tried to stick together. Calvin was great with ideas and working as the director of photography. He was also the best with the camera. Natalie and Gary were great crew members. They didn’t take school as seriously and just did what we told them. Gary was the best with audio but the audio studio intimidated him and he avoided it as much as possible sometimes leaving us high and dry on audio equipment for on locstion shoots. He was fun to be around but not a leader. Calvin, I, and others carried them throughout school. Think of them as great roadies. They could get all the gear and set it up and tear it down, but they never wrote scripts or produced or directed or edited. At least not well. They would pitch ideas that were unrealistic or just plain silly.

For our last semester, there was a ten day trip to Manhattan. The students attending would stay at NYU and be guided by a professor through New York’s film and video related hotspots like the SNL studio, MTV (this was during TRL’s hay day), VH1, and other studios, museums, and general tourist sightseeing locales like the Statue of Liberty and the Empire State building.

I really wanted to go but the astronomical cost of $1000 was too much of a barrier for me to overcome. I was an assistant preschool teacher with rent, utilities, and groceries to buy. My little buddies who lived with their parents were all getting to go. I had one saving grace: the merit scholarship.

It was hard for me to apply. It felt like bragging which made me uncomfortable. I had a friend look over my rough draft. Her words were something like, “You sound like you’re apologizing for any success you have had.” It was true. There was no confidence in my answers, and I continuously credited everyone else for my accomplishments.

When I finally did it correctly, I had a 4.0 in my video production classes. I had written, directed, and edited 27 of the 42 projects I completed. On the others, I either wrote, directed, or edited. The only project I didn’t have a major role on was setting up and breaking down audio at a venue for a popular band at the time. I want to say it was Buckcherry. On the way to the event, I found a tiny kitten and didn’t know what to do with it. Coincidentally, my core group did another music event where we interviewed the singer of Cherry Poppin Daddies. I guess cherries were popular at the time because there was also Eagle-Eye Cherry touring around.

One of my projects was a PSA I made using claymation which I entered for a national contest. For several months, my PSA was aired across the country. There was no monetary prize, but I was very proud of it. And that one I did all by myself after hours in the studio and editing suite. It was only 30 seconds long, but filming involved me setting up the lighting and cameras for the clay and running back and forth from the studio to the editing room where the monitors were. I even spent a significant amount of time in the audio studio recording myself as a voiceover for the video. I cannot stress how much time it took to make that 30 seconds of claymation perfection.

Another project I worked on was massive. The venue was a converted warehouse smelling of clove cigarettes and industrial floor wax. It had two iron-wrought balconies that looked down on a dance floor being used as a runway. Three designers were showcasing their work in punk, goth, and rockabilly styles. The goth designer was one of my best friends.

Our final product was amazing and was used by all three designers. In the end, we got rave reviews by our biggest critics, our professors. In some of our classes, the entire class had worked on this project. The only ones who didn’t deserve the praise were Gary and Natalie. They brought the equipment in and set some of it up, but they spent most of the time sitting together and chatting. At one point, Natalie had a drink even though she was technically there as a student and technically not of legal drinking age. It annoyed me at first until I realized I was the one responsible for dealing with this then I was enraged.

“Hey, you know you can’t be drinking on the job,” I said.

“It’s cool. I already did my work, and Gar volunteered to finish for me after, so I’m off duty,” she informed me.

“Natalie, you can’t be off duty on the jobsite and you certainly can’t be doing anything illegal,” I explained.

“I'm not doing anything illegal!”

“Underage drinking is illegal and makes us all look bad!” I exclaimed, getting a little louder and frustrated. I was used to working with three year olds. Disciplining a friend, peer, colleague was not something I expected.

“Chill out! You were drinking at that production last week. Don’t be a hypocrite!” she responded, getting louder as well.

“Natalie, I wasn’t working. I was already at that club with my friends. I had no idea anyone was doing a gig there. I was surprised to see y’all.”

“Yes, but volunteered to help,” she quipped.

“Sorry for being helpful,” I retorted. “You know this means you have to leave?” I reminded her. It’s part of the rules we sign when checking out equipment.

“I know what this is really about. You’re jealous that Calvin is spending more time with me than you,” she accused. I was a little jealous, but she was jeopardizing the whole project.

“Please stop yelling! You know the rules. This isn’t cool, Natalie. You’ve put me in a bad position, and I have to get ready soon myself,” I pleaded.

“You’re only modeling because the designer is your friend,” she declared.

“I know,” I answered. I wasn’t an aspiring model. My friend needed tall people to walk her shows. I did many of them. The last show I did for her was much later when I was 8 months pregnant. She designed primarily gothic wear and made me a maternity dress to walk in that was shear in the front to showcase the baby bump. I wasn’t a model, but I had a lot of fun doing it in my 20s.

“We only got this gig because she is my friend,” I added.

“If you kick Nat out, You’re kicking me out too,” Gary declared.

“You know the rules, Gary. Someone will report back that she’s drinking and I will be held responsible,” I insisted.

“Nobody knows it’s alcoholic,” he also declared.

“I know. I’m the producer. Get out,” I ordered. And they left. Their absence made zero difference in the production. My friends were superfluous. It did get back to the professors who were furious with Natalie for drinking. She was put on probation and eventually apologized to me. Gary never did but just hung out like nothing happened.

Later Gary stumbled upon his own massive project. He had a friend who worked at the relatively new Fox Sports Net and the project was in conjunction with them. As a result, many of the students who worked on the project, got their foot in the door at an actual master control of a broadcast company. What many of them were hoping for upon graduating. As a result, Gary was suddenly getting all the praise. Professors were hailing him as a hero because a couple of students already got jobs there. I was not included on that project. I was hurt and relieved because I didn’t want to work for Gary. He was unprofessional, disorganized, had mossy teeth, kinda smelled, and mostly offered ideas that were underwhelming. I don’t remember what the project was–something about kids playing hockey I think. The final product wasn’t ever used by Fox Sports and it didn’t receive a high grade.

My final project was a five team crew with people I didn’t know that well. We filmed drag races that our producer was involved in. His brother, cousin, uncle and friends were all racers. I was director, one of three camera operators, and the editor. We got amazing shots at different angles and right at the end, got to get closer to the track due to knowing the right people and got closeups of the lights and exhaust and tires squealing which made for cool edits.

I knew what song I wanted but was scared to propose my alternative music choice. The four adult men threw out a lot of ideas that were mostly heavy metal or tejano. As they discussed it, I started adding my song choice on the video. They didn’t like it at first, by the end, they all became Cake fans. We used “The Distance.” As the lyrics played, “Reluctantly crouched at the starting line/ Engines pumping and thumping in time…” I showed the zoomed in closeups of the engines visibly vibrating. The song hyped up the races and was the perfect choice. Our project got a 100. Even without the music, it was an exceptional piece of work but the music elevated the experience. Someone affiliated with the drag racing bought it and we each got like $50. It was exciting to get paid anything because then we could count it as professional work on our resumes. I saw it aired as a commercial a few times long after graduation. I have no idea how they got around using it without paying for the copyright. Or maybe they did. I’ll never know now.

It was almost the end of that trimester. Or major projects were turned in, grades were received, and the trip was announced. It would count as a class which meant if I went, I would only have school four nights a week instead of five for a ten day field trip to Manhattan. No matter how I pleaded, my parents refused to help cover any of the costs. I was devastated.

That merit scholarship was my saving grace, but at the last minute, Gary applied. His parents had already paid for the trip and paid for his tuition and books. It would be just a free $1000 to spend on the trip or however he wanted. I had spent the morning at the Montessori school, my knees grass-stained from kneeling on the playground, my mind a thousand miles away in Manhattan. I was already picturing the neon of Times Square. I had done the math a hundred times on my break. That $1,000 was the difference between eating street-cart pretzels in New York and sitting in my Houston apartment watching TRL on a 13-inch screen.

"It came down to a very narrow margin," my favorite professor told me in passing. "The committee decided to award the merit scholarship to Gary."

The word merit felt like a physical slap.

"Gary?" I asked. My voice sounded small, like it was coming from the back of a deep dubbing booth. "The Fox Sports project?"

"The partnership with Fox is a big deal for the Institute’s placement numbers," Henderson explained. "Gary’s initiative in securing that connection showed a level of professional networking the committee wanted to reward."

I wanted to scream about the "initiative." I wanted to tell her that Gary hadn't networked; he’d happened to have a friend who worked in a closet playing commercials. I wanted to point out that I had directed, edited, and produced twenty-seven projects while Gary had spent his lab hours trying to convince Natalie to like him. I wanted to mention the mossy teeth, the unprofessional drinking, and the fact that I had literally carried Gary’s merit on my back for two years.

"It was very close," Henderson added, as if that were a consolation prize.

"Close doesn't get me to Manhattan," I thought, but I didn't say it. I just nodded, stood up, and walked out into the Houston humidity, the weight of my academic erasure already beginning to settle in.